Hands on Lair

The controls for Lair seem pretty simple on paper. You fly around on the back of a dragon by tilting the Sixaxis controller and press circle to spew fire. The demo at Sony’s Gamers Day had players fly the dragon towards a group of ships with catapults attack the city. It’s easy to guide the dragon towards the ships since they aren’t moving and when you’re close enough you can shoot fireballs. Once you sink the ships the city gets invaded by ice dragons and things more complicated. The ice dragons aren’t stationary targets and you need to gently tilt the controller to follow behind them like if you were dog fighting. I think some people might be tempted to swing the controller rapidly when you’re in the heat of battle and that is absolutely not what you want to do. If you want a quick speed burst all you need to do is tap the X button to make Rohn whip the dragon. Once you get the hang of locking on and gliding with the controller you’ve got the concept of Lair, but beyond the dragon versus dragon battles I’m eager to see what else Lair has to offer like ground combat.